House Education committee reviews draft miscellaneous education bill, keeps adult-education safeguards and orders follow-up testimony

Beth St. James, Office of Legislative Council, reviewed draft 3.1 of a miscellaneous education bill before the House Education Committee and said most provisions were proposed by the Agency of Education and had been part of a miscellaneous bill that passed the House but not the Senate last year.

The committee discussed several substantive provisions in the draft, including language on school safety and behavioral threat assessment teams, removal of a reference to Goddard College, public-bid language for food services accounts, a deleted rulemaking requirement for virtual learning, changes to adult education and the adult diploma program, a BOCES startup-grant eligibility change, insertion of several placeholder bills (including intranasal epinephrine and a military-related postsecondary-opportunity bill), and proposed effective dates for the act.

The most contested item was proposed striking of a budget-year diagnostic provision tied to the adult education and secondary credential program. Beth St. James said, “most everything in here has been proposed by AOE and most everything in here was in the miscellaneous ad bill that passed the house last year.” Committee staff and members discussed that removing the diagnostic-language…